Top speed runs have been a thing of meticulous planning and great pride once achieved. In recent years Bugatti, Hennessey, and Koenegsig have held the record for the fastest production car. But, records are made to be broken. So, Engineers do what they do, get to work at finding ways to improve speed and stability. SSC North America recently attempted to claim the production car record with their hypercar called the Tuatara. Sadly, the pass was invalidated by questionable data and film analysis. To rectify that, they recently made a second attempt.

The SSC North America Tuatara hypercar

The SSC North America Tuatara is a 1,750 hp curvy designed road-legal hypercar. One of the goals in the production of the car was to surpass 300 mph. The company has been developing the car for several years and believes they have achieved their goal with the vehicle’s current iteration. 

There is only one way, however, to prove the speed goal has been achieved in real life and not in a computer simulation. So, SSC North America took the Tuatara hypercar out to a closed road and performed a top-speed run. Understandably, jubilation broke out amongst the crew when the initial data seemed to corroborate that more than 300 mph had been achieved. The story did not end there, though. 

As it turns out, the SSC team somehow didn’t have equipment calibrated correctly. Also, the run was not performed in two directions. So, the validity of the hypercar’s achievement was being challenged by many in the blogosphere. As people pressed SSC North America to come clean, the manufacturer stated they would do another run to clear up any confusion. Also, they indicated they would put redundant systems in place to verify each other of any data that came in from a run. Then the company went mostly dark, avoiding the top-speed run topic.

The second run of the SSC North America Tuatara

A few days ago, however, new information was released indicating that a second top-speed run was performed. The test took place in Florida with the hypercar between on-and-off rain. Race logic and Garmin tracking systems were used, amongst others. So, validation would not be a problem.

Although the top-speed run was completed, sadly, the world record top speed goal was not achieved. It seems that the owner of the Tuatara hypercar drove the vehicle only to 252 mph. However, that full speed attempt was hampered by heat soak, bad spark plugs, and possibly being down two cylinders. It seems SSC North America’s best intentions for the world record were thwarted again.

That is not where it ends for the hypercar

People involved with the testing believe the car has more to give. So, the SSC North America hypercar team is certainly not giving up. It is speculated that a Tuatara will be used to attempt another run. That run may happen soon, after the holidays. Certainly, they will do it with a car operating optimally and with care to cool the car down quickly. It seems, also, that they will do it care to provide facts and data for validation’s sake. Stay tuned.